Leftovers Become Sustenance For Needy

By MICHAEL deCOURCY HINDS, Special to The New York Times

Published: July 26, 1990

PHILADELPHIA, July 25—
The dinner menu, once again, was to be United States Department of Agriculture canned pork, canned corn and rice at a homeless shelter here for 50 single men and women with children.

''We would have doctored it up,'' said Ruth Birchett, director of the private shelter, called the Committee for Dignity and Fairness for the Homeless Shelter. ''But the phone rang, and there was Philabundance saying they were bringing us trays of prepared chicken, containers of noodles and a wonderful assortment of French bread, rye bread, muffins, doughnuts, Danish and croissants. That was really a blessing.''

It was a routine delivery for Philabundance, a private, nonprofit organization. Every day of the week, and at any hour of the day, Philabundance staff members and volunteers pick up surplus perishable food from restaurants, bakeries, supermarkets, airlines, hotels and caterers. Then they immediately deliver it to shelters for the homeless, day care centers for indigent children, emergency food pantries, drug-rehabilitation centers and public housing projects.

Nine years ago, there was only one organization in the nation that used perishable food this way, the New Haven Food Salvage Project, and it had just opened. Now there are similar programs in at least 54 cities, with the overwhelming majority opening in the last 18 months - encouraged by the realization that anyone with a vehicle and a telephone can make a difference. Organizers estimate the programs save well more than 25 million pounds of food a year.

Hungry by the Millions

About 20 million Americans, or 1 of every 12, suffers from hunger, according to a 1985 report by Harvard University's Physician Task Force on Hunger in America. And 20 percent of all food is wasted as it moves from farm to table, according to a 1977 study by the Government Accounting Office, the auditing arm of Congress. That food waste amounted to 137 million tons a year, or enough to feed 49 million people. Those studies, although dated, are still considered the best data available.

''There is enough surplus food in every city to feed everyone in that city who is hungry,'' said Helen VerDuin Palit, who founded the New Haven program and one in New York called City Harvest. She said that City Harvest, founded in 1982 and now the largest program, provided 13 million meals last year at a cost of 39 cents a meal, for transportation and overhead.

Hunger is largely invisible in American cities, something most people can only read about. ''I read ''Starving in the Shadow of Plenty,'' by Loretta Schwartz Noble in 1983, and it opened my eyes to the problem of hunger among the working poor, elderly and homeless,'' said Pamela Rainey Lawler, who gave up her work as a communications consultant to start Philabundance. ''I realized it was more important to use my skills to address the hunger problem than it was to write speeches about pension plans and gas lines.''

Coming Full Circle

Ms. Lawler, who is 40 years old, is married to a lawyer, Denis, and they have three children. ''I'm your typical Sixties' person, and I've personally come full circle,'' she said. ''We heeded our elders back then, that you can only change the system from within. Now we are the system, and it's time to make some changes. We can't operate under the delusion that the poor will always be poor; the institutionalization of hunger has to be fought.''

Ms. Lawler used her research skills to identify organizations that need food and to find willing food donors, and in May 1984 she started making her rounds in her family's station wagon - along with a 9-month-old foster child that a city agency had put in her care. Now Philabundance has budget of $150,000 a year, raised from public and private sources. It has a modest office in the suburb of Manayunk, a staff of 4, 20 volunteers and 3 vehicles, 280 donors and 100 recipient agencies. In December, the Mitsubishi Corporation donated a refrigerated truck. Philabundance collected and distributed 500,000 pounds of food last year; with the additional truck, Ms. Lawler expects to transport more than a million pounds of food this year.

On a recent day, Philabundance drivers, wearing snappy blue jumpsuits, made about 40 pickups and as many deliveries. Donations included 120 pounds of lettuce from a food co-op, 100 pounds of chicken from a country club, 40 pounds of hamburger from the Philadelphia Zoo, 200 pounds of ice cream from an Italian food shop, 125 pounds of bread from Sheraton-Society Hill Hotel, 300 pounds of produce from a suburban orchard, 200 pounds of fish casserole from a tour boat, the Spirit of Philadelphia, and 600 pounds of bread, milk and chocolates from a New Jersey supermarket.

Many Walks of Life

Around the nation, people from all walks of life have started similar food-salvaging programs. Founders include a judge and a limousine service operator in Atlanta, a computer company executive in St. Paul, a church school coordinator in Buffalo, an anti-hunger advocate in Houston, the owner of a cooking school in San Francisco, a business management instructor in San Diego and a political science student at Boston University. And Representative Tony P. Hall, chairman of the House Select Committee on Hunger, helped organize a food-salvaging service in his Dayton, Ohio, district.

Major corporations and foundations have also taken notice of these programs. Pizza Hut became the first national company this year to offer its surplus food to local programs, and the United Parcel Service became the biggest benefactor, giving a total of $1.8 million to 16 food recycling programs, including $82,000 to Philabundance. ''We felt this was something we could really sink our teeth into,'' said Clement E. Hanrahan, director of the company's philanthropy. The company's distribution specialists also plan to analyze the operation of the programs and recommend ways for them to improve efficiency, he said.

The perishable food programs have a national support group, called Share Our Strength, with headquarters in Washington. The organization acts as a clearinghouse for information on the food services, and it holds annual fund-raising banquets in fancy restaurants. Last year, banquets in 66 cities raised over $1 million; banquets are being scheduled for 120 cities next spring.

No Tax Incentives

Food-salvaging services have been able to grow unimpeded by corporate concerns of liability, which slowed the growth of food banks in the 1960's and 1970's. In 1981, all states enacted ''Good Samaritan'' laws, which make food donors immune from most liability claims if a gift of food should cause anyone to become sick. Companies have no financial incentive to donate food because the Internal Revenue Service does not allow tax deductions for such donations, which it considers to be one step removed from the garbage pail.

The hardest part of operating a recycling service is knowing that many children are still going hungry, said Ms. Lawler.

''It's a heartbreaking situation,'' she said.

Photo: A private nonprofit group in Philadelphia called Philabundance picks up surplus perishable food from restaurants, bakeries, supermarkets, airlines, hotels and caterers and gives it to the needy. Resi dents of a shelter called the Committee for Dignity and Fairness for the Homeless unloaded a truck. (Bill Cramer for The New York Times)